


Difficult Conversations Regarding the L Word

by orphan_account



Series: Arthur, Charles, Javier, and Albert [2]
Category: Red Dead Redemption (Video Games)
Genre: DON'T LET THE MULTIPLE RELATIONSHIP TAGS FOOL YOU, Emotional Baggage, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Healing, Light Angst, M/M, Multi, Non-Graphic Smut, Oneshot, THIS IS A POLY SHIP AND EVERYONE LOVES EACH OTHER, mostly just talking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-30
Updated: 2019-12-30
Packaged: 2021-02-19 01:01:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,176
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22036009
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: "Why do you never say it back?" Javier had asked. "Do you not love us?"//In which Arthur reminisces on all the "I love you"'s. A short one-shot with the OT4.
Relationships: Albert Mason/Arthur Morgan, Arthur Morgan/Charles Smith, Javier Escuella/Albert Mason/Arthur Morgan/Charles Smith, Javier Escuella/Arthur Morgan
Series: Arthur, Charles, Javier, and Albert [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1586119
Comments: 11
Kudos: 78





	Difficult Conversations Regarding the L Word

"I love you," Javier nuzzles into Arthur's neck. He's comfortable here, in the arms of his lovers, just spending a rare moment of peace together and savoring it for all it's worth. 

"'Love you too," Arthur says, and somehow the words still feel alien on his tongue. They bring a blush to his cheeks, a mumble to his tone, a bashful tilt to his head, hiding his face with his hat. They're not words he'd accustomed himself to saying in any context, but now... Well, they were commonplace as anything. Shared between the four of them, exchanged like glances.

An "I love you" was often the first thing spoken when the sun rose, kissed into sleep-warmed skin. A reassurance and a thank you in one, gasped like a mantra, bitten into a pillow. 

To Arthur, an admittance of truth. A humble thing that perhaps only a few years ago, he would have scoffed at. Would've seen as a weakness. A softness, a luxury that he couldn't afford, didn't  _ deserve _ . Didn't think about.

It hurt the three of them sometimes, when they had taken their first tentative steps toward togetherness, between all those fumbling nights in the dark and all the things that went unsaid-- Arthur was always the one to bring them together, to admit he loved them in all but words, but the last to understand that Charles and Albert and Javier loved him back. They'd say as much, all their relief and affection and frustration poured into the simple statement, and Arthur would smile a little sadly and brush it off like an insincere compliment. 

It had taken a few times, a few "I love you"'s, for the confusion to come to a head. Javier had only voiced what the others were thinking.

"Why do you never say it back?" Javier had asked. "Do you not love us?"

Arthur had blanched. "No! No, I-- god, of course I do, it's just...  _ Shit _ ." He'd leaned back in his saddle then, rubbed a hand tiredly down his face. "'Course I love you all, I just..." He took a moment to process his thoughts. "I dunno. _ I dunno _ ."

Javier let the quiet simmer between them. Let Arthur chew on his thoughts. They put a decent amount of trail behind them before he spoke up again.

"It's just-- it feels wrong that decent folk like you three even... Even  _ say _ shit like that to me. Just to make me happy."

Javier had shot him a weird look then. "What, like we don't mean it?"

"No! No, like... You  _ do _ mean it. And... That's... That's what's off-putt'n about it. I dunno.  _ Shit _ ," he'd cursed, embarrassed.

Javier didn't let him shrug out of that conversation, not when they still had so much time between them and their destination. "Did you think we were just humoring you?" 

Arthur had shrunk in on himself a little. "'Course not. Just... Thought you all mighta' wanted somethin' outta me at first, just, goin' along with me 'cause I'm... Useful. Err, I try to be.” he scratched the back of his neck. “Then... Y'started sayin' shit like "I love you" and... Don't rightly know what to do with myself. Dunno what I did to deserve it, 's all."

And then, for Javier, it finally clicked into place. 

_ Camp work horse _ . All those years of service, all that time and effort and love, and all he got in return was empty promises, manipulation-- not a single "I love you" to show for it.  _ That's what he thought love looked like _ . An empty quid pro quo, a tit for tat-- some unspoken, unreciprocated thing that Arthur gave away and never expected to get in return. Thoughts raced through Javier's head, and the man was silent for a long minute. 

How many? How long?

How many lovers, how many friends--  _ family members _ ? had taken this man's generosity, his love, and used it to their own ends? How many had never reciprocated the love that Arthur gave with his whole heart? 

How many had used him up and tossed him away like Dutch had?

_ How had they mistaken the scars for  _ pride  _ all this time _ ?

"Arthur..." Javier said softly, breaking the silence.

Arthur hesitated to look at him, afraid he'd gone too far, revealed too much.

When he did glance over, Javier's eyes were watery. 

"I'm sorry."

Arthur grunted, incredulous. “ _ Why _ ?”

Javier sniffed. “I just... I thought you were just too  _ proud  _ to say it. I didn’t even think.” He wiped a tear on his sleeve. “It hurt our feelings, me ‘n Charles an’ Albert, and-- we thought you just had some hangup or something about the word, but-- was it Mary? A-and Dutch? Who made you feel like, like you had to  _ earn  _ it?” 

Something in Arthur’s chest twisted. The token refusal was caught in his throat, hitching in his lungs. He couldn’t lie to this man.

“Probably.”

Suddenly, the few feet of space between their horses was a yawning chasm. A  _ claw _ , some fervent protectiveness,  _ pain,  _ gripped Javier’s heart. “Let’s stop for the day,” he said. His voice was low. Arthur nodded once.

Dismounting, he felt like his legs couldn’t carry him fast enough, and when he reached Arthur, he almost bowled the man over in a hug that carried the weight of all the words he wished he could articulate, all the feeling that he only knew to express in his heart. Arthur was stunned for a moment, before he melted into the embrace. 

“‘M’sorry,” he mumbled into Javier’s collar. 

Javier’s grip tightened at the back of Arthur’s coat. “Don’t you dare apologize,  _ vaquero _ . I love you so much.”

Arthur’s brow furrowed, and he squeezed his eyes shut against the mounting tears. “Love you too.”

It felt appropriate for that to’ve been the first time he returned those words. They still feel no less alien on his tongue now, but that rawness that accompanied him the first dozen times is gone.

They'd made love that day, in a barely-set-up camp that was little more than a tent hidden by the underbrush, and Javier had taken his time to kiss the tears that streamed down Arthur's cheeks as he came. A hundred little "I love you"'s breathed out into the twilight, a hundred more when they awoke and embraced each other, as if the physical contact could sponge away the pain layered on over decades. They returned home in another two days, and Arthur's generous, shy little "I love you"'s were a fond surprise to Charles and Albert. The explanation would come with time, but for now, Javier settled happily into this new chapter in their lives, with Arthur's tangible giddiness each time he told his lovers how he loved them.

The gesture feels less like baring his soul to the wolves now, and more like that rib-crushing hug that was so warm on that cold mountain trail. The words feel like home, with his lovers and their little house with a fire in the hearth that melts the frost on the window panes. 

**Author's Note:**

> Oops I fell in love with them :V


End file.
